Lenses for 35-mm Cameras

The Leica, from Leitz, and the Contax, from Zeiss Ikon, were the most important 35-mm cameras in the period before World War II, and lenses for these cameras illustrate the performance available at that time. In most cases, modern computer-optimized designs are far superior. In this chapter, most of the performance data and lens drawings are shown at the same scale. MTF curves show the performance at 30, 15, and 7.5 cycles/mm, plotted as a function of field angle. Bearing in mind that the 35-mm film format is 24 x— 36 mm, 30 cycles/mm represents a resolution of 1200 pixels across the image. Transverse ray aberration curves are plotted with a scale of 0.10 mm. Longitudinal astigmatism plots are plotted on a scale from -ˆ’0.4 mm to +0.4 mm. Distortion plots are scaled automatically, so the scale is different for each lens.